A técnica e a tecnologia na agricultura familiar da comunidade de Conchas Velhas - Ponta Grossa (PR)

Abstract

This paper aims to identify the techniques and technologies that are used in vegetable production by farming families in the Conchas Velhas community (Ponta Grossa-PR), as well as to analyze their importance to the permanence of families in the countryside. Technology started to be used more intensively in agriculture, in Brazil, due to the Green Revolution (Revolução Verde in Portuguese), in the second half of the 20th Century, as a consequence of policies that benefited the purchases of chemical inputs and agricultural machinery. From that, the techniques and technologies used in agriculture have been changed, although it has not happened equally throughout the territory. The inequality between small-scale and large-scale farmers had started back in the time when the access to technologies and credit policies began, a process in which small-scale farmers turned out to be the most impaired. Thus, concepts about technique, technology and family farming are used in this paper as the basis for a study on the farming families’ reality in Conchas Velhas. The research was performed through fieldwork and semi structured interviews with farmers from the community, as well as a bibliographical analysis on the subject. Techniques and technologies are fundamental to the explored group since they allow families to produce high quality foods, to have more control about what is produced in the properties, and to reduce manual labor dependence.